This invention relates to a disk changer, and more particularly to a disk changer which includes a rotatable tray having a plurality of accommodation portions arranged in a ring-like configuration. A disk-type recording medium is suitably selected from among disk-type recording media accommodated in the accommodation portions so as to perform recording and/or reproduction and so forth for the selected disk-type recording medium.
A disk changer is conventionally available which includes a rotatable tray having a plurality of accommodation portions arranged in a ring-like configuration for accommodating a plurality of disk-type recording media therein such that major faces of the disk-type recording media oppose each other. The rotatable tray is rotated and a desired one of the disk-type recording media is taken out by a disk takeout mechanism so that recording or reproduction of an information signal onto or from the disk-type recording medium may be performed.
A conventional disk changer having such a configuration as described above includes a detection section for detecting whether or not a disk-type recording medium is accommodated in each of the accommodation portions of the rotatable tray and the address of each of the accommodation portions to which addresses beginning with the first address and ending with the nth address are applied, a recording and reproduction section including an optical pickup, and a disk takeout mechanism for transporting a disk-type recording medium between any of the accommodation portions and the recording and reproduction section.
In the disk changer, after a disk-type recording medium to be recorded or reproduced is inserted through a disk insertion opening and accommodated into one of the accommodation portions of the rotatable tray, the rotatable tray is rotated. Then, detection of presence or absence of a disk-type recording medium in each of the accommodation portions and detection of the address of each accommodation portion are performed successively in order by the detection section disposed below the rotatable tray. After the address of the accommodation portion into which the disk-type recording medium inserted through the disk insertion opening has been accommodated is detected by the detection section, the rotatable tray is rotated in a direction based on a result of the detection until the accommodation portion at the detected address in which the disk-type recording medium is accommodated comes to a disk takeout position at which the disk-type recording medium can be taken out from the accommodation portion by the disk takeout mechanism. Then, the disk-type recording medium is taken out from the accommodation portion by the disk takeout mechanism and transported to the recording and reproduction section, by which recording or reproduction of an information signal onto or from the disk-type recording medium is performed.
When the disk changer is used, the user sometimes wants, for example, to replace a predetermined disk-type recording medium into an accommodation portion different from the accommodation portion in which the disk-type recording medium is currently accommodated. In this instance, in the conventional disk changer, the disk-type recording medium to be replaced is taken out manually through the disk insertion opening once, and then the rotatable tray is rotated until the accommodation portion into which the disk-type recording medium is to be accommodated newly comes to a position corresponding to the disk insertion opening, whereafter the disk-type recording medium having been taken out is accommodated into the accommodation portion manually.
However, where a replacing operation for a disk-type recording medium is performed manually in such a manner as described above, considerably long time is required. Particularly with a disk changer called mega-changer in which as many as several hundreds disk-type recording media can be accommodated, such a replacing operation as described above is not easy.
Further, if it is tried to successively record or reproduce disk-type recording media accommodated in those accommodation portions which are spaced by a great distance from each other, then the rotatable tray must be rotated over a corresponding long distance (angular distance) requiring a long period of time as much. This gives rise to a disadvantage that a long period of access time is required before next recording or reproduction of a different disk-type recording medium is started.
Furthermore, in the conventional disk changer, the disk insertion opening can be opened during recording or reproduction for a disk-type recording medium, and therefore, a new disk-type recording medium can be accommodated into a desired one of the accommodation portions of the rotatable tray.
However, when a new disk-type recording medium is accommodated into a desired one of the accommodation portions of the rotatable tray as described above, if the accommodation portion in which the new disk-type recording medium is accommodated is the same as the accommodation portion in which the disk-type recording medium for which recording or reproduction is currently proceeding was accommodated before such recording or reproduction, then such a situation occurs that the original accommodation portion into which the disk-type recording medium whose recording or reproduction comes to an end is to be accommodated is occupied by the new disk-type recording medium.
If such a situation as just described occurs, then such a trouble that such registered information as “a certain disk-type recording medium is accommodated in an accommodation portion of a predetermined address” is disturbed occurs, resulting in a registration error. This will give rise to a trouble to the user.
Further, in the conventional disk changer, since it includes only one recording and reproduction section, in order to record or reproduce different disk-type recording media successively, it is necessary to first take out the disk-type recording medium, whose recording or reproduction has come to an end, from the recording and reproduction section once by means of the disk takeout mechanism and accommodate the disk-type recording medium into an accommodation portion of the rotatable tray, and rotate the rotatable tray until the accommodation portion in which the disk-type recording medium to be recorded or reproduced next is accommodated comes to the disk takeout position, at which the disk-type recording medium can be taken out from the accommodation portion by means of the disk takeout mechanism, and then transport the disk-type recording medium to the recording and reproduction section by means of the disk takeout mechanism to perform recording or reproduction for the disk-type recording medium.
However, in the conventional disk changer, since it includes only one recording and reproduction section as described above, it is impossible to record or reproduce different disk-type recording media incessantly and continuously.
Further, when it is intended to perform recording or reproduction for different disk-type recording media successively, two times of transporting operation of the disk takeout mechanism and a rotating operation of the rotatable tray are required before recording or reproduction of the later one of the disk-type recording media is started. Therefore, a long period of accessing time is required before recording or reproduction of the next disk-type recording medium is started, and in this regard, the disk changer is inferior in convenience in use.
Furthermore, while recording or reproduction for a first disk-type recording medium is proceeding, accessing to a second disk-type recording medium is impossible at all. Accordingly, while recording or reproduction for the first disk-type recording medium is proceeding, the conventional disk changer cannot register TOC information of the second disk-type recording medium and cannot grasp the total reproduction time for all of the disk-type recording media accommodated in the accommodation portions of the rotatable tray either. Thus, the conventional disk changer is disadvantageous also in inconvenience in operation.